Recently, a trend in home construction has been toward relatively large-size bathrooms. Such bathrooms, especially those provided for the master bedroom, tend to be significantly larger than those found in older homes. Frequently, owners of such older homes desire to renovate or retrofit such smaller-sized bathrooms with, for example, a larger tub or shower enclosure. Unfortunately, the additional room required for such a retrofit is often not available within the confines of the existing bathroom. Few options are available to such homeowners.
One option is to "stick-build" an addition to the house, which, simply for the luxury of a larger tub, may be considered by many as cost prohibitive. A second option is a building extension in the form of a "bathroom/ensuite" module including a preformed shell and external wall as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,380. According to that patent, the preformed shell is installed through an opening in an exterior wall of the house. The external wall, preferably embodied as a bay window, covers the preformed shell and is fit to the exterior wall of the home. According to the patent, the preformed shell may be located partially within the bay of the bay window allowing the homeowner to expand beyond the confines of an existing bathroom. It is believed that the disclosed ensuite extension requires additional foundation or other supporting structure thereunder, adding expense and complexity to such a retrofit.
The present invention is intended as a low cost, easily-implemented alternative to known bathroom retrofitting approaches.